


Violence against raptidons

by lemonskies



Category: The Outer Worlds (Video Game)
Genre: Blood and Injury, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, injured!Felix, worried!max
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-10
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2021-01-27 04:07:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,184
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21385822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lemonskies/pseuds/lemonskies
Summary: Prompt: I'm a sucker for hurt/comfort, and the way the companions react when one of them gets downed in combat is like,,,fuck. So like how about Felix getting hurt or downed or whatever and just like,,,Angry but soft Max
Relationships: Maximillian DeSoto/Felix Millstone
Comments: 10
Kudos: 139





	Violence against raptidons

“Felix is down!” The captain shouted, only barely managing to avoid a spray of acid heading their way. They quickly collected themselves again and bashed in the raptidon’s skull with their tossball blocker, but Max couldn’t do the same thing. There was so much happening around him; Raptidon roars, the captain’s battle cries, the ringing in his ears, but the only thing he could focus on was Felix’s agonized scream and the sight of him falling to the ground like a sack of potatoes, clutching his side with trembling hands.

“No! No no no!” Max’s voice cracked uncharacteristically as he ran towards Felix. A raptidon was moving in on the kid and Max only barely managed to fire his shotgun in time, splattering brains all over the ground. Fuck, there was a lot of blood, both blue and red, and Felix looked like he was so close to passing out. “_Shit_,” he cursed. He knew he should be focusing on dealing with the raptidons instead of leaving the captain to their own devices, but Felix was _bleeding_, and not an insignificant amount either. He needed help.

Another loud battle cry echoed through the Monarch wilderness as the captain charged at a massive raptidon, and Max was pretty sure he heard bones cracking. They seemed to be doing fine on their own for now, which relieved some of the guilt Max had about leaving them.

“Stay still, Felix,” he hissed, but with the way Felix was drifting in and out of consciousness he figured it wouldn’t be much of a problem. He pulled out one of his adreno syringes and stabbed it into Felix’s thigh. Felix let out a strangled whine and Max almost felt bad for hurting him even more. It wouldn’t be enough, though, he needed real medical attention, but for now it would at least keep him alive long enough for them to get back to the ship.

“Oh no, don’t worry about me, I’ll be-aaagh! Die!” The captain swung their tossball blocker at the raptidon’s face and a spray of blue blood splattered all across their body. “I’ll be fine!” they panted, and Max figured he might have to start pulling his weight again, before his captain became raptidon chow.

“Try not to die while I’m gone,” Max told Felix, but he only got a weak nod in response and more blood smeared across Felix’s fingers. They had to hurry this along. He loaded his shotgun and jumped into battle with the captain, who almost seemed to have _fun _beating the shit out of these dangerous creatures. Max supposed it was good that they got at least some enjoyment out of it, because they had been doing this a lot lately, and shaking hands with death every day hadn’t exactly been on his agenda.

Finally the last raptidon fell from a blast of Max’s shotgun, and the battlefield went quiet. The captain, who had been more up close and personal with the beasts, was covered in blue liquid that smelled like sulfur, and Max couldn’t help the mildly disgusted look crossing his features.

“We have to get Felix to Ellie. I don’t think he can walk by himself.” Max felt something inside of him start to ache at the thought of losing Felix or having to leave him behind. Despite all their fights and disagreements and bickering Felix really was a valuable part of the crew who had a mean swing with a tossball stick and a terrible taste in tossball teams.

“I can carry him,” The Captain suggested. “We’re not too far from the ship, so it shouldn’t be too much of a problem.” They didn’t wait for input from Max and instead just knelt down in front of Felix and picked him up with an amount of ease that really shouldn’t have been possible. Felix may’ve been the youngest on the team, but he was still a grown man, tall and muscular and definitely heavy enough to cause the captain some serious backpain. Felix let out a quiet groan as he was picked up and Max swore he saw him tense up in pain, but at least he was awake and alive and not bleeding out on the ground.

The walk back to the spaceship was long and nerve-wracking. Normally they would’ve covered that distance in half the time, but the captain had a lot of weight to carry and they couldn’t exactly move quickly, and every moment that passed Felix was losing more and more blood.

“Captain, are you sure you’re okay to keep carrying Felix?” Max asked after a while.

“I’m much better equipped to carry him than you, old man. I would hate to see you break your hip,” the captain teased, but Max could tell that they were just as worried about their crewmate as he was, which is why he didn’t take the captain’s comment to heart. “It’s just a little bit longer and then we can safely rest inside the ship.”

Felix was still only half-conscious, his head rested on the captain’s shoulder and his face looked paler than ever, but all Max could focus on was the deep wound in Felix’s side. At least they were almost to safety, because Max wasn’t sure how much longer they could keep going like this, and his worry was starting to eat him alive.

* * *

“Ellie!” the captain shouted as they stumbled into the ship, practically running up the stairs to the kitchen and – gently – dumping Felix on the kitchen table. Ellie jumped into action immediately when she saw the damage, not even asking for an explanation as she examined the wound.

“He’s lost a lot of blood,” Max said. “Do you think he’s going to be okay?”

“If I didn’t know you better I might say you were worried about him, Max,” Ellie replied, getting to work on cleaning the wound and stopping the bleeding.

“Of course I’m fucking worried. I’d even be worried if _you _were bleeding out on the kitchen table.”

“Aww, I’m flattered.” Ellie’s voice kept that same, teasing edge it always had, but Max wondered if he maybe heard a hint of genuineness. “Now everyone get out. I gotta focus on this and I can’t do it with everyone breathing down my neck.”

The wait was agonizing, and Max found himself pacing up and down the hallway until Parvati put a hand on his shoulder and forced him to stop.

“We’re all worried about Felix, Mr. Vicar, but Ellie is a great sawbones and I’m sure she’ll fix him right up.” She shot him a kind smile and Max almost felt reassured.

If Felix was meant to live he would, it was all part of the Plan after all, but for the first time he couldn’t find peace in that. What if Felix wasn’t meant to live? He never thought he would be so concerned about this stray orphan who seemed determined to rile him up as much as possible, but as they spent more time together he had actually gotten… _attached _to him. Everything that used to bother Max about Felix had started to become somewhat endearing, even his stupid questions and his anarchist ideology and his willingness to walk into fire for his friends.

All Max could do was wait, though, and wait he did. It felt like hours passed while he waited in his cabin, flipping through his books and staring at the wall. The captain stopped by once - looking just as nervous as Max felt - to make small talk, but neither of them were really in the mood. It was just something to fill the time, a poor attempt to break the tension in the air.

When Ellie finally left the kitchen and announced that Felix would be okay, but that he’d need to rest for a while, Max could breathe again. In the end he figured it hadn’t really been all that long, but time seemed to slow down in these situations, fear and worry making a minute feel like an hour.

“The wound is pretty deep and he somehow managed to crack a couple ribs,” Ellie explained. “Don’t know what the hell you guys got yourself into, but try not to do it again. Now, can someone get his ass out of the kitchen, because I’m not carrying him.” The captain jumped into action, looking just as relieved as Max felt as they carried him to his own cabin and but him down in his bunk.

“Thanks, boss,” Felix slurred, “for not letting me die.” Max had expected him to be out cold due to the blood loss, but he couldn’t be glad enough to know it wasn’t as bad as he thought it was.

“As if I’d ever let you become raptidon food, dumbass,” the captain replied, “You’re a part of the team.”

“Alright, I think I’m gonna pass out now…” Felix said, and then proceeded to do exactly that.

* * *

“Hey, vic,” Felix said when Max walked into his cabin. According to the captain he had been awake for a while now, but Max had been thinking about what he wanted to say, and he still wasn’t sure he wouldn’t yell at Felix for running headfirst into danger. “Didn’t expect to see you in here.” Felix’s voice sounded a little strained and the bruises on his torso were a stark contrast to the crisp, white bandages wrapped around him.

Max said down on the side of Felix’s bed, still not sure what to say, but his anger and concern had started to bubble over. “What the _hell _were you thinking?!” Well, at least he had tried not to yell for a good 5 seconds. “You can’t fucking fist-fight a raptidon colossus, you idiot!”

“Jackass had it coming. Besides, I’m still alive, aren’t I?” Felix sounded much too casual for a guy who could’ve died from that stupid stunt he pulled.

“Yeah, _barely_! You had all of us worried sick. You can’t just run into fire whenever you fucking please. I- _we all_ care about you.”

“Aw, vic, I didn’t know you cared,” Felix said, before bursting into a coughing fit that had him groaning and clutching his injured side. “Ow, fuck.”

“Of course I care, moron. What the hell makes you think I don’t?” Felix had to think about that one for a bit, his face twisting into a thoughtful frown.

“Well, you always look down on me, for one.” He paused for a moment, like he was trying to find the words to say what he needed to. “But I guess not that much lately… And we’ve gotten along better recently… Wait…”

“Take your time.”

“You _actually _like me.”

“I tolerate you.”

“Whatever you say, vic, I know you’re just lying to yourself.” The triumphant smile on Felix’s face made Max feel kind of warm inside, the kind of warm that made him want to smile, too. Instead he rolled his eyes, but it was more for show than anything, because Felix had hit the nail right on the head. Max did like Felix, maybe more than he should for someone his age, but it was not like he would ever act on that or admit it out loud.

“Promise me you won’t do something stupid like that again,” Max said, but before Felix answered he already knew it was of no use. Felix had a penchant for running headfirst into danger without thinking. “Thinking only gets in the way of doing,” Felix had told him once, and as far as mottos went that was definitely one of the worse ones, but arguing with Felix only led him in circles.

“You know I can’t do that. If my friends are in danger I’m going to fist-fight a raptidon.”

“Yeah, that’s what I figured you’d say.”

“You… You _really_ care…” Felix said it like it was a revelation, like they hadn’t just discussed how much Max cared, and a part of Max ached at the thought that Felix might _know._

“We just established that, yes.”

“No, I mean-“ He stopped himself mid-sentence to look at Max, head tilted in a way that almost made him look like a puppy. “You care like no one else on this ship does.” Oh _fuck. _

“Felix, I don’t-“

Despite how much it must’ve hurt to lift his arms like that, Felix reached up to put his hands on the back of Max’s neck and pulled him down until their faces were only inched apart. “Coward,” he whispered, before pressing their lips together in a kiss that was almost too gentle. In every single one of Max’s fantasies – not that he fantasized about this – it had been rough and desperate, their rocky relationship finally coming to a head against the wall of Max’s cabin, but it was nothing like that. It was soft and careful, like they were too afraid to break each other, and when they finally pulled apart Max felt like a different man.

“I’ll try not to fist-fight raptidons unless it’s absolutely necessary,” Felix promised, and Max supposed that was all he could ask of him.


End file.
